Prince Build/Wonderaholic cure New SG'ers welcome

[Ralph_Jackson]

Idle, makes sense - hope the race goes well.

This is an "interesting" start in that if we get copper City then its a start that can come good once we fill out the dotmap, if we don't get copper city then it is drifitng towards a definitely crappy start. Of course with an easy start it wouldn't be anywhere near as much fun.!!

Ralph

 

[Lampness]

We're also gonna need sailing to get copper to our capital. Or road it..but that'll take a while and it'll also be very vurnable to barbs.

 

[idle]

Okay, here goes:

Turn 1 (2000bc):

Turn 2 (1975bc):
Some ancient fellow recon us to be 2nd in culture

Turn 3 (1950bc):

Turn 4 (1925bc):
Worker finish chop - Settler in 2
Worker moves NE to chop

Turn 5 (1900bc):

Turn 6 (1875bc):
Settler built - start worker (A really poor decision - Note to self: Reckless is bad on raging barbs )
Settler moves cautiously south

Turn 7 (1850bc):
Lion killed by copper city watch (1.9 health) promoted to woodsman I

Turn 8 (1825bc):

Turn 9 (1800bc):
Panther killed by stoneguard (2.0) promoted to strength I

Turn 10 (1775bc):
Agriculture finished (dang, forgot to switch) - start fishing (7 turns)
Chop finished - worker in 1
Worker moves to road cow (smokey...)

Turn 11 (1750bc):
Worker built - start warrior (6 turns - timed with fishing)

Turn 12 (1725bc):
Barbs incoming!!! , two warriors -> move warrior to suicide jungle position (East).
Thought about whipping - decided to wait 1 turn to see outcome of battle
Settler arrives on city spot, along with copper city guard
Stonegard moves SW to help defend homeland.



Turn 13 (1975bc):
Lose warrior to barb, killed 1, 1 left at 1.5 health
Medina founded, in the nick of time (see screenies below) - expect galleys in near future...


Medina founded: We've found Hatty! Close call...


We have to whip to survive, I think. Sorry guys! I hate whipping the capital...


Overview of our "glorious" hut federation:


We are now at -3 gold/turn, 87 gold in our chambers .

---

Here I stopped. We need to whip a warrior to stand a chance I think.

I need help attaching the save. Anyone?

EDIT: Never mind... How did that happen???

 

[ChrTh]

I need help attaching the save. Anyone?

EDIT: Never mind... How did that happen???

lurker's comment:
If you upload a save or pic to a post but don't place it within the text, it's auto-appended to the bottom.

 

[idle]

ChrTh: Yeah, figures. Thanks.

The next turns are obviously crucial, but with some help from the RNG God we should survive at least.

Remember that Stoneguard Warrior has +10% strength. I figured he needed that more than woodsman at the moment, since he's all alone on the plains.

 

[Lampness]

I got it and looked at it. I don't think we need to whip yet, there's only 1 barb warrior with 1.5/2 health. I'm gonna move our warrior to that roaded hill and put him on defend. Hill+defend bonus should do it. Atleast till the other warrior comes out.

I think I'm gonna switch Medina from building a warrior to building a worker (15 turns), because we gotta get this copper connected fast. Also Medina is safe from north (unless Hatty decides to attack us early) and theres 2 warriors there already.

About getting that copper to our capital...Should we go for pottery after getting fishing or go for sailing? Sailing will take 18 turns to research (total 22 turns, since fishing will get done in 4 turns). It should get done exactly after Medinas worker finishes connecting copper to Medina.

What do you guys think?

 

[idle]

Does our northern warrior have moves left?

We now have 2 workers around Mecca. We could build some troops and build the road all the way down. It'll probably take forever, though.

We need sailing eventually, and since we have copper we don't need horseback riding for a couple of thousand years, the only other option is iron working to clear the jungle.

We could also build a road so that the rivers connect.

I say we go for sailing, because we are going to need galley evetually anyway.

By the look of things, we may not even get our allowed ancient age wonder...

 

[Lampness]

The warrior doesn't have any moves left, but it doesn't matter, I can move him next turn. Barb warrior is healing.

Okay then, I'm gonna go for sailing.

Making roads so that the rivers will connect will still take a lot more time than just getting a 3rd worker and sailing :/.

 

[Immaculate]

Alternatively, you could just specialize your cities more and accept that your axes come from Medina and food-based builds (like settlers and workers) come from your capital (in which case getting those clams hooked up becomes that much more of a priority). You don't NEED copper in all your cities, only in those that are going to build axes.

You could build a barracks in Medina and make it your military city for awhile, which would allow future cities to specialize on commerce, or wonders, or whatever you may require.

This frees up your research for worker-techs or a run at alphabet or iron-working to clear that jungle and get future cities out quicker.

I think you may do well to get your next few cities up more quickly which would require iron working.


Whatever path you choose, good luck and enjoy.

Immac.

 

[Lampness]

Finished my turnset...

Turn 0 (1700bc):

Medina --> worker. Tech path changed (sailing instead of pottery).

Turn 1 (1675bc):

Barb warrior moved on our roaded grassland hill. Moving our warrior closer to our capital. Everything's still safe.

Turn 2 (1650bc):

Barb warrior pillaged the road :/.

Turn 3 (1625bc):

Barb warrior attacked our's, and we won. Moved him to our capital as he only had 0.1/2 health left. Other warrior due in 1 turn.
New barb spotted on NE hills just outside Mecca's borders.

Turn 4 (1600bc):

Forest on a grassland hill gets chopped, ordered workers to build a mine on it.
Warrior finishes, started building another one (due in 1 turn due to the chop).
'Nother barb warrior just outside our borders. This is gonna get intresting .


Turn 5 (1575bc):

Our defending warrior on a forest tile killed an attacking barb warrior.
More barbs appear from east.
Mecca finished building a warrior (total of 3), started another (due in 5 turns).

Turn 6 (1550bc):

Barb warrior moves next to our capital, probably going to pillage that road.
Doesn't matter though, as that road was useless anyway. Rather let him pillage, than have our warrior dying from attacking.


Turn 7 (1525bc):

He didn't pillage. He attacked our warrior that was on the forest tile. We won, no health lost. Gained a promotion (picked forest/jungle defence).

Turn 8 (1500bc):

Another barb dies to our warrior.

Turn 9 (1475bc):

Mecca finishes building a warrior. Move him to south, to guard our borders.
Mecca's building a work boat.

Turn 10 (1450bc):

'Nother barb comes from east, he's probably gonna attack our +50 defence bonus warrior though, so we're safe.

Turn 11 (1425bc) (crap forgot I was supposed to play 10 turns .)

Barb moves closer.



Mecca is safe from barbs for now I think. Next player should probably focus on getting a 3rd city. Also I didn't see any barb activity going on near Medina, so Medina should also be safe for now. Atleast till the barb axemen come out.

 

[Ralph_Jackson]

Well things have gone well despite a difficult start. This is probably now time to pause for Breath and decide on our next move.

I have got to go out this evening (Real Life intervenes) so will just post a few thoughts for discussion.

1. Capital will soon have a good source of food in clams will soon be time for the . Don't be shy you know they enjoy it really .

2. City Specialisation will be key to digging us out of the poor start position.
i) Copper town will in the short term be our only axe city. Barracks can wait for a while as Axemen will soon get promoted with all those Barbs. Raging Barbs is going to make it fun
ii) Short term commerce boost can come from Mecca with lighthouse so when we don't desperately need Warriors priority for Mecca has to be Lighthouse then Granary (after the work boat comes out. => Sailing was a good choice to be followed by Pottery -> Iron Working.
iii) We need another city but one that is defensible and not overly dependant on Iron Working. This looks like Yellow Dot as Pink Dot would be harder to defend at the moment
iv) Is the Copper Mine built so Medina can be put on perpetual Axe build for a while?

We can now revert to 10 turns each (though feel free to stop at a crucial point if you want)

Roster

UNCPenguin in the Capn's Chair
Ralph On deck

 

[UNCpenguin]

got it. will play and report soon.

 

[UNCpenguin]

(0) 1425bc
Just look around each city and press enter
IBT- Barb warrior coming from the SE of mecca and woodsman warrior defeats barb warrior coming from NE of mecca without taking a scratch
(1) 1400
Forest chopped, 1 turn left on the workboat. I MM'd mecca for more commerce since production didnt matter and cut a turn off of sailing, due in 5.
IBT- barb from SE runs away
(2) 1375
Work Boat -> settler due in 18
IBT - barb moves back to border
(3) 1350
WorkBoat sets up fishing settler cut to 13
(4) 1325
Barb invades. I though about sending the strength warrior to him since the road was there, but he only had a 70% to win to I sent the worker to mecca hoping that the barb would attack the woodsman warrior.

Worker finished in Medina -> obelisk
Worker builds a road to the copper. looking at it now I should have built the mine first for the extra production but I didn't think about that at the time and we would need the road eventually.

(5) 1300
Barb decided to attack the wooded warrior and die without hurting our dude.
Promote warrior to woodsmen II. Worker sent back to farm construction. I thought about whipping the settler since we now had the clams but decided to wait for the chop to finish.
IBT- 2 more barbs headed to mecca from the east and SE.

(6) 1275
Chop puts the settler due in 4. I also sent the strength barb to the hill 2 tiles SE of mecca to defend against one of the barbs.
IBT- str warrior wins with the hill defense bonus

(7) 1250
str warrior sent back to mecca. more importantly sailing is in -> pottery is up next. the road to the copper finished and mine is due in 6.

(8) 1225
wooded warrior slays another barb warrior

(9) 1200
settler done -> lighthouse due in 18 and start a road towards the rice but can't do anything with it til IW.
(10) 1175
2 more barb warriors spotted in the east now they may actually head for the farm instead of the warrior in the woods.
Here is a look inside Mecca:


Ok, so the copper mine is done in 2 and will be available to both cities. I didnt do anything with the settler yet, it is still in mecca for ralphs discretion, possibly with an axe escort. Pottery is due in 3.

 

[idle]

UNCPenguin wrote:
Forest chopped, 1 turn left on the workboat. I MM'd mecca for more commerce since production didnt matter and cut a turn off of sailing, due in 5.

Is this true? I thought the production was carried over to the next build. Anyone know for sure?

Anyway, nice turns UNCPenguin and Lampness. It's good to see that we're safe and growing nicely.

We should discuss our next city placement.



In addition to yellow, red and purple, we can have two or three extra cities. I think either the dark blue sites or the turqouise (sp?) ones (ignore the brown one, I mucked the placement up).

We should close off our peninsula ASAP, before Hatty gets any ideas. What is the easiest way to do it? Eastern turq does the job nicely, but do we want a city there? It will have 7(!) mountains in FC, not really a good site.

Thoughts?

 

[Lobsterboy]

I've been thinking about this myself. The turquoise dot in the Cirque is a stunningly craptastic site, but it is probably the best one to keep Hatbag at bay. At least the rice is in the fat cross.

In any event, we will need to build an Obelisk/Library both there and in Medina to get border pops to seal us off. (We'll need to research Meditation.) I'll bet you dollars-to-doughnuts though that Hat lands some colonists on the plains south of the rice before then. We should have a 2 axe welcoming committee ready to greet her ASAP.

 

[idle]

By taking eastern turq we get one poor and one good city, if we take the blue sites we get one fishing village and 2 relatively good cities.

If we're going to fight on Hatty as early as when she comes for our lands, we shouldn't go for poor city sites. We'll be much better off going for IW and red dot to power up, IMHO.

 

[UNCpenguin]

No, your right idle, the production would carry over but I ment there was nothing left to build really other than a settler until more research came in.

 

[Atlas]

No, your right idle, the production would carry over but I ment there was nothing left to build really other than a settler until more research came in.

Lurkers Comment

As I understand whipping it works like this-Lets say that I whip a chariot that is almost done and 20 shields carry over, but I choose for my next build a warrior (cost 15 shields), the 5 extra sheilds will not carry over again and are wasted. So depending on how much carry over you had it either made no differnce that you put the shields to a work boat, or you wasted a few (not very likely). In any event probably putting those shields into a worker or settler would have been a good choice.

If you all want to reduce the barb problems, put warroir sentries all around you bit of land there so that all (or almost all) of the tiles are always "visible" (is that clear, I don't think I articulated that well), any way. That is my two cents.

I really like your theme, I know that wonder addiction is both difficult to overcome, but once you do, and you realize that a 400 shield Pyramid is like 12 Axemen (and thus you can take all the land of a rival) you end up playing at least a level higher. I think the Oracle is the biggest crutch in the early game - I would avoid it, it will be tough to get at higher levels or if you do, it won't yield a tech that makes the effort worth it.

Sorry for butting in.

@UNCPenguin- Do you go to UNC?

-Atlas

 

[idle]

No, your right idle, the production would carry over but I ment there was nothing left to build really other than a settler until more research came in.

Well, I didn't say you were wrong to do it. 1 turn can mean a lot in this game.
One of the things I suck at is city MM. I hope I can pick up a few pointers in this SG.

Someone said on this forum once: "When in doubt, build a worker". It works remarkable well.

 

[Ralph_Jackson]

Well as we have all galloped through the turns and got our hands dirty time to discuss strategy

Wonders

Curing wonderholicism is the key to moving up from noble, hence the theme! The best tips I got to winning my first (and only win )game on Monarch were:
No Wonders
Go for BW and Pottery,
Build Granaries then
Build Library (using the whip if required) + 2 scientists
Only build infrastructure you know you need and why - if unsure build an axeman and kick some butt instead!!

So what wonder should we permit ourselves
Pyramids - non-industrious + stone in a crappy location => needs a lot of chopping so forget it
Oracle - Too much of a crutch + on higher levels you really struggle to do a meaningful Oracle Slinghsot so best learn to win without it

What do I advocate?

Great Lighthouse 'cos
We are a coastal civilzation
Has along life span through to Corporation
No Resource requirements so we are on a level playing field
Achievable as not top priority for the AI.
Will also show the avlue of Hrabours (an undervalued bit of infrastructure)

Colossus is an alternative but expires earlier with Astronomy which we may need to build fairly quick if we are stuck on a small island (A distinct possibility having only met Hatty so far).

Tactics re Hatty.

The extra cities may be a red herring as by the time we have built the three key cities (red, yellow and pink) and grown our economy ready to expand we will be getting ready to whip hatty's ass . So if she builds a city for us it saves us a settler!. Seriosuly building red, yellow and pick and getting them up to speed is going to take a long while and we can't afford an unprodcutive , distant and expensive city to close off Hatty.

Tactics for my turnset

Move warriors further out from cities to remove more fog of war and reduce Barbarian spawning grounds

Settler - Torn between Yellow and Pick dot here. Pink more immediately productive with the two seafood resource + further away and harder to defend than Yellow dot. (views welcome )

Research

Finish Pottery , then Animal Husbandry, then Ironworking

Builds, Axes up to what feels safe.
Mecca to get a lightouse fairly soon for increased food
+ Library. (scientists will help our research when we are commerce poor)

Other

free up a warrior to find out what/who else is on the island.